So "Uncle Tom's Cabin" made the crack of the slavedriver's whip, and
the cries of the tortured blacks ring in every household in the land,
till human hearts could endure it no longer.
CHAPTER VII.
UNCLE TOM'S CABIN, 1852.
"UNCLE TOM'S CABIN" AS A SERIAL IN THE "NATIONAL ERA."--AN OFFER FOR
ITS PUBLICATION IN BOOK FORM.--WILL IT BE A SUCCESS?--AN UNPRECEDENTED
CIRCULATION.--CONGRATULATORY MESSAGES.--KIND WORDS FROM ABROAD.--MRS.
STOWE TO THE EARL OF CARLISLE.--LETTERS FROM AND TO LORD SHAFTESBURY.
--CORRESPONDENCE WITH ARTHUR HELPS.
The wonderful story that was begun in the "National Era," June 5,
1851, and was announced to run for about three months, was not
completed in that paper until April 1, 1852. It had been contemplated
as a mere magazine tale of perhaps a dozen chapters, but once begun it
could no more be controlled than the waters of the swollen
Mississippi, bursting through a crevasse in its levees. The intense
interest excited by the story, the demands made upon the author for
more facts, the unmeasured words of encouragement to keep on in her
good work that poured in from all sides, and above all the ever-
growing conviction that she had been intrusted with a great and holy
mission, compelled her to keep on until the humble tale had assumed
the proportions of a volume prepared to stand among the most notable
books in the world.
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